She slipped off her deep blue Donna Karan suit jacket, leaving just the trousers and a somewhat playful Ralph Lauren blouse.
Playful for corporate work, anyway.
Better. At least she didn’t appear ready to kick the opposing counsel’s ass.
Steeling herself, she marched out the front door and crossed the lawn to Jake’s house. Almost sunset, the lights inside were on and glowing. Against her better judgment, Carla peered through the window to the living room, but no one was there.
Is he in the bedroom?
Does he have a client with him?
What are they doing? Is she handcuffed? Is Jake licking her?
Just as it had yesterday, the front door opened.
Carla flattened herself to the exterior wall, the situation far too familiar. This was getting ridiculous.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to walk you to your car?” Jake asked.
“No, honey. I want to remember you just like this all week. You and your incredible body. It isn’t every day I get to feast my imagination on a naked hunk.”
Carla almost jolted out of her hiding spot just to get a peek.
Jake is naked? Right there, a few feet away?
How do I have a little peek without showing myself?
“You’re sweet, Mimi.”
“No, I’m selfish. And do me a favor, would you?”
“Anything, Mimi.”
“Could you stroke it as I walk to my car? I really want to know you’re getting at least a little of the pleasure you’ve given me. Promise?”
Jake chuckled. “I promise.”
Jake’s door thunked closed, and the woman’s heels clicked across the porch. Moments later Carla could hear a car door open then close along the street, then an engine started up.
Now what was she going to do? If she went to the door now, Jake would know she’d seen his client leave, that Carla had heard what she’d said. That she was imagining him naked, taking himself in his hand, and…
Stop it.
He might even think she’d come over on purpose. No, she needed to tell him about what Janet had done, but she should wait. Give him a chance to… relieve himself.
She pushed up from her hiding spot. Passing by the living room window, she peered inside.
Jake stood behind a sofa, his back to her. He stared out the room’s front window, watching his client pull her car into the street.
Carla knew she should jerk back, duck out of sight before he turned around, before he spotted her, but she couldn’t move.
Jake wasn’t nude, not exactly, but he might as well have been. He wore no shirt, no pants, only the thin black straps of a G-string clinging to his naked skin. His back tapered from broad shoulders to narrow waist and hips. Bare butt, strong thighs, his hand right there, making good on the promise he made to Mimi.
His buttocks bunched as he shifted his weight, turned away from the window, his manhood straining at the G-string’s leather pouch…
Carla stumbled backward, out of his view.
Did he see me?
She didn’t know. Holding her breath, she waited for the door to open, for him to call her name, for the world to come down on her in a suffocating blanket of humiliation.
Nothing happened.
Hand clapped to her chest, as if that would help calm her racing heart, she waited until she was absolutely sure he hadn’t seen her, and then she took another peek into the living room.
His back was to her again, but he wasn’t stroking the leather pouch. Instead, his thumbs were hooked into the straps, pushing them over his buttocks, down his thighs. He bent forward at the waist, slipping the G-string off, and Carla caught her first glimpse of his heavy length swaying between his legs.
Wow.
WOW.
She needed to get out of here. To run home. To stop this peeping nonsense. But she didn’t move, just waited, mouth dry, to watch what he did next.
I’ve lost my mind.
I’m a pervert.
Oh my god is he gorgeous.
Jake straightened, now completely naked, and when he turned slightly to the side, Carla let out a little gasp.
He was hairless, just as he’d teased the first time she’d met him. He was also large and more erect than she’d ever seen a man. His shaft stretched out then scooped upward to a prominent ridge and pronounced glans. Jake wrapped his fingers around his base, then stroked upward, lifting his balls. He thrust his hips forward with the move, as if he was surging deep into a woman. And when he moved his hand over his tip, his cock sprang free, bobbing upward.
Carla leaned against the window’s casing. She’d never been interested in seeing male strippers. She’d never been into porn. But right then, she doubted she could tear herself away even if a police car pulled up, lights flashing.
Jake took himself in his fist again and started pumping, root to tip then back down.
How would he feel in my hand?
The velvet-soft skin sliding over the hardness underneath. The way he would flex under her fingers. The way he would pulse if she held him tight.
What would it be like to slide him over my breasts? To take him into my mouth, circling him with my tongue? To cup his balls in my hand, feeling their weight, their heat?
Something had come over her, but she wasn’t sure what. Lust, probably. She’d never been a big blowjob fan. She’d always taken a guy’s cock for granted. It was always there, and every guy she had been with was always focused on making Carla service it. What else was there to think about?
But now, looking at Jake, she realized she’d been missing something. Was it pure physical attraction? Or a nice guy who seemed to be truly interested in who she was? Maybe the combination of the two.
And here I am, peeping through his window like some sort of crazed stalker.
He was grunting now, butt clenching, eyes closed. She knew the look. He was ready to explode.
Closing her eyes, she made herself turn away, even though every impulse in her body wanted to… no, needed to watch him come. She forced her feet to move, one in front of the other, carrying her across the bit of lawn between houses.
She had to find a way to regroup, to get back in touch with who she was. Not some lust-crazed cougar. Not a career woman desperate for love. Not a peeper, a stalker who stood outside windows and watched private things no one else should see.
She needed to regain control.
Carla headed for the pier.
Through the house, down the stairs, across the patio, and she was walking on the deck board, her footfalls resonating over the water below. All the lakefront houses had piers reaching out into the water, some with boats tied or hidden in boathouses. After Carla’s bad experience as a kid, she had never purchased a boat. Her neighbors had probably found it strange, but she didn’t care. She loved the lap-lap-lap of the water against shore and footings. Loved the sparkle off the waves. Loved the view of mountains, a wisp of a shadow in the distance.
She sat down on her zero gravity outdoor lounge chair and leaned back, the evening sun shining from behind her, highlighting the breathtaking view. A light wind fanned her heated skin.
She had to calm down.
Think unsexy thoughts.
Resist the urge to daydream. To fantasize. To touch herself.
Stop it!
Sailing. She needed to focus on the boats skimming over Lake Washington. Remember what it was like that day so many summers ago.
“What are you thinking about?”
Carla jolted up from her chair to find Jake grinning at her, dressed in his usual t-shirt and jeans. Only now she knew what was underneath.
She forced her attention onto the lake. “Sailing, actually.”
“Beautiful day for it.”
She almost said there’s no good day for sailing, but stopped herself. She liked Jake. It wasn’t his fault that she was a deviant voyeur. And the last thing she wanted was to be rude to her neighbor. “Um, yeah.”
“Hard
day?”
Not as hard as yours.
I will not look at his package.
Carla, don’t look at his package.
She glanced at his package, right at eye-level, then played it off awkwardly with a kind of weird yawning motion.
“It was really hard. Uh, I mean trying.” She closed her eyes again and let out a sigh. A cold shower. That’s what she needed. Wasn’t that supposed to calm people’s… urges?
“I have just the thing. It’ll help you relax.”
Carla’s eyes flew open, her gaze landing smack on his crotch again. It was like he had a giant magnet in his pants, and her eyes were made of iron ore. She jerked her gaze up to his face. “Oh?” She could feel the heat creep over her again, only the fanning wind keeping a blush from blooming on her cheeks.
“Yeah. You have any more of that beer?”
How many had they had last night? She was so focused on him, she didn’t remember. “A few more.”
“Why don’t you get them, and I’ll meet you back here.”
“That’s nice, Jake, but I…”
“You have plans?”
“Well, no.”
“You have work to do?”
“No more than usual.”
“Then grab the beers and meet me back here. You won’t be sorry. It’ll be relaxing. And fun. Just two neighbors, enjoying the outdoors. Nothing more than that.”
Carla managed a nod, forced herself out of the deck chair, and traced the pier back to the patio. Mounting the steps to her house, she had to admit that after what she’d seen through Jake’s living room window, she could only think of one fun activity, and with the jitters traveling through her limbs, she wasn’t sure relaxing was part of the picture.
She grabbed what was left of the six pack, only two beers. Not nearly enough. She checked the cabinets for wine, found a stray bottle of Pinot Noir and two crystal glasses, pocketed an opener, and headed back to the lakeside. When she reached the end of her pier, there was no sign of Jake. She waited a couple of minutes, staring out at the sparkling water, then collapsed back into her deck chair, popped the top off a Bell’s Hopslam, and took a long drink. Resting her head back on the chair, she closed her eyes, trying to keep her mind off of Jake, why she’d gone to see him in the first place, and how she was going to explain Janet’s booking when he returned.
Waves lapped against the dock’s moorings. Nearby a boat motor started, then chugged out of its slip. Birds screeched overhead.
The sound of the boat’s motor grew closer.
Carla opened her eyes to see Gloria Hotchland’s Catalina Morgan 440 sailboat approaching her pier, sun sparking off its white fiberglass body, sail masts stabbing into the air. Jake stood at the helm, a grin lighting his face. He got in close, then tossed a mooring line and expertly lassoed the cleat on her deck.
“Better to go sailing than just think about it, don’t you think? How does a sunset cruise in The Gloria sound? Named for the fabulous Mrs. Hotchland by her dear, departed husband. I think he liked the idea of riding Gloria all day and night.”
Ice seized Carla’s stomach.
He finished tethering the boat, then motioned her to join him.
Carla forced herself out of the chair, but when she tried to take a step toward the boat, her knees started to shake. “I… I can’t. I have to go.”
Jake gestured to the wine and beer. “You brought all that just for me? Because I prefer not to drink alone.”
Carla shook her head. “I just… I can’t.”
“Okay. How about tomorrow? I don’t have a client until eight, and the weather’s supposed to be great.”
Carla opened her mouth then closed it. Of course, she was his eight o’clock appointment, and there wasn’t a chance she was setting foot on that boat. Carla needed to tell him both things, but at the moment, she felt so flustered and out of her element, she couldn’t find the words.
Carla was never at a loss for words.
He stepped up onto the pier, approaching her. “You really should take a look at this boat, though. It will only take a second. The cabin is amazing. Gloria’s late husband didn’t skimp on a thing.”
“No, really. I don’t…”
“Oh, come on. Five minutes.” He opened the last beer and held it up clinking his bottle to hers then scooped one arm around her back, ushering her toward the boat.
Carla took a swig of beer, then another, hoping the alcohol would help steady her nerves.
I’m not a little girl any more, for crying out loud. I’m a grown woman. A kick-ass lawyer. A successful homeowner with a house on the beach. I need to stop being such a baby.
Letting Jake guide her to pier’s edge, she focused on breathing.
In and out.
In and out.
Jake stepped onto the craft. Standing in the cockpit, he reached up his hand. “It’s an easy step.”
Easy? Maybe. It wasn’t as if they were going out on the water. They would be right next to the pier.
Carla grasped his hand, and his fingers captured hers. She focused on the step, placing her foot square in the center, shifting her weight, stepping in with the second foot…
The boat rolled up, then down.
Carla shuddered, a gasp catching in her throat.
Another wave hit, the boat bobbing, Carla’s whole world shifting under her feet.
“Are you oka—”
Carla lurched into his arms, clinging like a desperate kitten. “I have to get off. I have to get off.”
He circled her with strong arms, pulling her against his chest. “You’re okay. I’ve got you.”
“You don’t understand. I can’t. I have to get back on land, I—”
“Okay. Gotcha.” Jake scooped her up, one arm behind her back and the other under her knees. A second later, and she was back on her feet on the pier, her whole body trembling, tears welling in her eyes.
She blinked them back. “I’m so embarrassed.”
He pulled her close, smoothing her hair out of her eyes, as if he was tending to a child. “Something happened to make you afraid of boats?”
Carla nodded, but it took several seconds before she trusted her voice enough to speak. “I was twelve, staying at my dad’s new place.”
“Your dad was into sailing?”
She could tell he was expecting some kind of tragic story. “It isn’t a big deal, not really.”
“Seems like a big deal to me.”
“It’s not. That’s why I’m embarrassed.” She made herself push out of his embrace and stand under her own power. “I fell.”
“Into the lake?”
“Into Puget Sound.”
“That’s scary.”
“I was wearing a life jacket.”
“Still scary. Puget Sound is a pretty big body of water.”
Carla shivered, remembering the cold waves, the endless tossing, and her so small in the midst of all that water. “There was nothing I could do but float, try to keep my head up, hope my dad would come back. There were big waves. Some fog. I couldn’t see him. I didn’t know if he’d ever find me.”
“Were you out there a long time?”
“It seemed like forever, but my dad said it was only five minutes.”
Carla looked up at him. The evening sun sparkled off the stubble lining his jaw. Jake’s eyes focused squarely on hers, as if he was really listening, really cared. Which had to be nonsense, because Carla knew men. They cared about stocks. And cars. And sports. And snacks. And pretty much everything but women talking about past traumatic experiences.
Jake was a better actor than he gave himself credit for.
“I know,” she said. “It’s lame.”
“Not lame. Sounds pretty terrifying. Have you been afraid of water since?”
“I’m not afraid of water. I like to swim. I love sitting out here on the pier.”
“You just aren’t good on boats.”
“Yeah.” She glanced over at The Gloria, and the tremors still seiz
ing her muscles increased.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were afraid of boats? We didn’t have to go out on the lake. I only suggested sailing because you said you were thinking about it. We could drink beer on the deck.”
“If you don’t mind, I’m not much in the mood for hanging out.”
“Because the boat freaked you out? You just said that was lame.”
“Look, I’m just not up for conversation. Is that okay?”
“Is it something I did?”
“No.”
“So what is it?”
“Having a conversation about why I’m not up for conversation makes no sense.”
“All right. Let me walk you back up to the house.”
“You don’t have to, really.”
“I’d like to.”
She braced a hand on his shoulder, controlling the distance between them. “That’s sweet, but I just need to… regroup.”
The only thing she could think about at the moment was getting back inside her house where she could fall apart in private.
“Some other time?”
“Sure. Some other time.”
Carla hurried away, up the pier, across her lawn, and made it inside her solarium before she realized she’d forgotten to tell Jake that she was his eight o’clock client, and that she needed, more than anything, to cancel.
She’d practically had a nervous breakdown in front of this man.
There was no way she was going to pay to get naked in front of him.
No way.
Four
Carla couldn’t relax, tossing and turning in bed as she alternated between self-pity and self-loathing. She finally got to sleep around two in the morning, and had vivid dreams that she was tossing and turning and couldn’t get to sleep. When she woke up, she was exhausted.
Work was awful. Carla had back-to-back meetings all morning, an appeals court ruled against her in the afternoon, and by the time evening rolled around, she found herself stuck in stop-and-go traffic that raised her cortisol to dangerous levels. She just wanted to get home and have a drink. Maybe take up some incredibly mindless hobby that induced a state of zen, like crocheting. That’s what Carla’s mother did when stressed.
Want It Bad: A Kinky Romance Page 6